Hello!
Some of you might remember me as the owner of Darwin, a sulcata tortoise. Unfortunately in August Darwin met an early end. I was utterly devastated, however I decided to try again and bought another hatchling who I later named Lucy after a well known ecologist (Gotta stick with the scientist theme). For the first few months she was great, however he appetite and energy slowly began to dwindle to almost nothing. She has gone to a reputable reptile vet, and after a pretty thorough examination the vet could not find anything wrong with Lucy and told me that it was likely the winter months sending her into a torpor (a period of inactivity), which she mentioned may happen to some tortoises even though they don't hibernate.
That being said, she is on EcoEarth substrate and I try and keep her humidity around 70%. I offer her Mazuri and Spring Mix, but if she does eat it is usually a bite or two. She has a hide which she rarely uses as she tends to just curl up under the heat lamp in the basking area which is around 90F.
I work at a well known aquarium in the mid west and frequently work with rescue tortoises, including Sulcata's and redfoots. I'm well aware as to the potential medical conditions to watch out for, however I'm not seeing any of these on Lucy. No watery eyes or runny nose. She isn't pyramiding (the little bit she's grown). While I do believe she could be experiencing torpor, I just wanted to see if anybody else had any thoughts.
Some of you might remember me as the owner of Darwin, a sulcata tortoise. Unfortunately in August Darwin met an early end. I was utterly devastated, however I decided to try again and bought another hatchling who I later named Lucy after a well known ecologist (Gotta stick with the scientist theme). For the first few months she was great, however he appetite and energy slowly began to dwindle to almost nothing. She has gone to a reputable reptile vet, and after a pretty thorough examination the vet could not find anything wrong with Lucy and told me that it was likely the winter months sending her into a torpor (a period of inactivity), which she mentioned may happen to some tortoises even though they don't hibernate.
That being said, she is on EcoEarth substrate and I try and keep her humidity around 70%. I offer her Mazuri and Spring Mix, but if she does eat it is usually a bite or two. She has a hide which she rarely uses as she tends to just curl up under the heat lamp in the basking area which is around 90F.
I work at a well known aquarium in the mid west and frequently work with rescue tortoises, including Sulcata's and redfoots. I'm well aware as to the potential medical conditions to watch out for, however I'm not seeing any of these on Lucy. No watery eyes or runny nose. She isn't pyramiding (the little bit she's grown). While I do believe she could be experiencing torpor, I just wanted to see if anybody else had any thoughts.